As we take a chance to look back on the 2017 season I’d like to begin by thanking you for your support over the last year. The ongoing support of our committed Members is invaluable to our club and it was great see so many of you join us throughout the year. In 2017 we set another Wests Tigers record, with 18,023 Members and we look forward to increasing that number again next year.

You would have seen that the club held its annual awards night last week, now known as the Kelly-Barnes Awards. I’d like to thank two legends of our Foundation Clubs, Noel Kelly and Keith Barnes, for allowing us to name our highest award in their honour. Both men showed the qualities we want to see in our players over their careers and it was great to be able to name Elijah Taylor as the first ever Kelly-Barnes Award winner. I’d like to congratulate all of our award winners:

Kelly-Barnes Award – Elijah Taylor
NRL Player’s Player – James Tedesco
NRL Members Player of the Year – Elijah Taylor
Club Person of the Year – Shaun Spence
Woman of the Year – Cilene Quintao
Rookie of the Year – Jacob Liddle
ISP Player of the Year – Jeremy Marshall-King
ISP Player’s Player – Nathan Milone
NYC Player of the Year – Daniel Peck
NYC Player’s Player – Daniel Peck

We still have one major event on the Wests Tigers calendar to round out 2017. Our Members and fans asked for it to come back and we’ve delivered. I look forward to seeing many of you at the Wests Tigers Grand Final Lunch on Friday 29 September. This event is one of the off-field highlights of the year and will return to Le Montage in 2017.

We’ve got some great entertainment lined up with special guests including Head Coach Ivan Cleary, Triple M’s Jamie Soward, Ryan Girdler and Anthony Maroon, NRL Commissioner Wayne Pearce, comedian Chris Radburn, as well as some of our first-grade squad and coaching team. Tickets are limited so I encourage you to get a group together and organise a table for this great afternoon out. Tickets can be purchased by calling the club on 8741 3300 or emailing sponsorship@weststigers.com.au.

Over the last two weeks we were able to lock down a number of players for the coming seasons. It was great to be able to confirm the re-signing of Elijah Taylor for the next three years, Matt Eisenhuth for the coming two and both Kevin Naiqama and Tim Grant for 2018. We also look forward to welcoming Robbie Rochow to Wests Tigers for the next two seasons. All five men are committed to being a part of what we’re building here at Wests Tigers and we look forward to watching them further develop into the future.

It was also great to be able to announce that Benji Marshall will be returning home in 2018. The feedback from our Members on the signing of Benji was incredibly positive and we can’t wait to see him back in a Wests Tigers jersey. Benji can’t wait to return to the club and be a part of our future and we look forward to welcoming him home. But before then he’s fully committed to Brisbane’s finals campaign and we wish him the best of luck with that.

We’ve said a few times now that there are a couple of seats left on the bus for 2018 and that we’re in no rush to fill them. It’s clear that there is still plenty of player movement to happen between now and the start of the 2018 season and we’re happy to bide our time and make the right move at the right time.

I’d like to thank those of you who recently submitted questions for our Q&A session with myself and Ivan Cleary. I hope that you enjoyed the clips and gained an insight into where the club is currently positioned. One of the most popular line of questioning was around our planned Centre of Excellence. I want to assure you that we’re working very hard behind the scenes to bring this plan to reality. It’s a complicated process with numerous stakeholders at all levels of Government but we’re confident that we’ll get the result that we’re after, and that this club and its Members deserve. I will reiterate again, this is a long process but in the end we envisage a beneficial one.

I’ve said in these updates a number of times now how proud the club is of the work it does in the community. We are so much more than a football team and have the opportunity to make positive changes in the lives of those in our community. We took another major step in this area recently with the launch of the first Wests Tigers Reconciliation Action Plan. This Plan demonstrates our readiness to develop and test innovative approaches to reconciliation and champion it at every level of the organisation. The RAP includes more than 90 deliverables and we are committed to putting them all in place and making a difference.

I’d like to finish by thanking those players who finished up with the club at the end of this season. On behalf of everyone at the club I’d like to thank them for their contribution and commitment while here at Wests Tigers. We wish them all the best for the future, whether they are continuing to play the game or are entering life after football.

Justin Pascoe
Wests Tigers CEO

Source : Members Email

Ivan's Laws

1. You are either on the Bus or you are off..
2. The Star of the Team is the Team
3. Be the player your teammates want to play with..